According to a White House report on the effect of sequester cuts, U.S. Customs and Border Protection would be forced to reduce work hours by the equivalent of 7,750 employees nationwide, increasing wait times at airports and border checkpoints and decreasing border security.

Wait times at the San Ysidro Port of Entry could extend to five hours during peak holiday weekends, from the current peak average of about three hours, according to the report.

The White House report said about 64,000 civilian Defense Department employees would be furloughed, reducing their pay by about $399.4 million.

Grants and assistance

Approximately $8 billion in federal funds are spent on grants and assistance payments subject to sequestration in San Diego County each year.

While the amount makes up about a fifth of the county’s federal take, the funds get dispersed among 340 different programs. Medicare, scientific research, housing assistance, special education programs, student improvement programs, preschool, assistance to new, low-income mothers, public transit and airport improvement grants, and a large collection of grants to local governments are among the programs facing cuts under the sequester.

Aside from Medicare, which accounts for about $4.7 billion of the funding in this category, the next-largest share of spending here is on scientific research, including $2 billion in grants approved by the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Energy.

The two largest beneficiaries of research grants here are the University of California San Diego, which received about a half-billion in grants in 2012, and the Scripps Research Institute, which netted more than $250 million in grants in 2012, according to the government’s grant database.

Another large assistance program in San Diego County consists of subsidized housing for very low-income residents. According to the White House, cuts to the program, which sends about $340 million to San Diego County each year, threaten to displace about 125,000 families nationwide.

Douglas Rice of the Center on Budget and Policy priorities told the Associated Press recently that the housing cuts will mean families who leave subsidized housing will be less likely to be replaced from people on waiting lists and that over time some could lose their housing.

About $250 million in grants for construction projects, training and housing assistance to the San Diego Regional Airport Authority, San Diego County, San Diego Association of Governments, and area public transit districts are also subject to the cuts.

Cuts to education aid, including preschool, special education and student improvement programs and school construction projects likely won’t be noticed until the start of next school year, because funding usually gets sent out in the fall. The San Diego Unified School District collects the largest share of grants in this area.

Unemployment benefits for the long-term unemployed, which are different from state unemployment programs for those who just lost their job, could be cut by $400 per worker over the year, according to the White House budget office. The reductions could begin immediately and amount to about $30 per month.

Maggie Acerra of the San Diego County Tea Party Forum, a Santee-based activist group, said government spending is out of control. She predicted the government won’t go through with the cuts for fear that people won’t mind — and will in fact demand deeper reductions.

“This is less than 3 percent of the (budget),” she said. “This is a drop in the bucket. They’re afraid that if this happens the American people are going to say ‘Good start’. We never get rid of anything in the government. We just add to it. We want them to take out that red pencil and slash, slash, slash and they’re afraid to do it.”